


Before, After, Again

by MaevesChild



Series: Borders Yet to Be [7]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games)
Genre: Arranged Marriage, Declarations Of Love, F/M, Married Couple, One Shot, So Married
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-09
Updated: 2015-10-09
Packaged: 2018-04-25 15:15:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4965856
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MaevesChild/pseuds/MaevesChild
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Takes place after the Until We Sleep comic series.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Before, After, Again

Alistair had been gone for a very long time. Long enough that Anora went from cursing his name and hoping he never returned, to crying silently at night that he wouldn't.  

She hated feeling this way.  In fact, she hated that she felt anything towards him at all.  Bad enough that she'd foolishly fallen in love with Cailan despite their arranged marriage.  It was so much worse that she'd also fallen in love with his brother.

_Madness._

She was certainly capable of running things without him, though he was admittedly a far more adept ruler than Cailan had ever been.  He was patient and diffused angry Banns with humor and managed to so deftly sway them to his point of view, they never realized what was happening.  But he'd left without warning, without telling anyone in the middle of the night like a thief, leaving behind only a letter saying he was going to follow up on a lead about his father.

She understood that, at least.  Her own father had disappeared to whereabouts unknown, some rumor said he was alive in Montsimmard serving the Wardens and others said he was dead.  Either way, her letters never received replies.  If she'd had something more concrete, she couldn't say she wouldn't have sent men to look for him.

She wouldn't have gone herself, however.  

 

She was plenty skilled with a blade, but she was a queen first.  There wasn't time to put her own needs first.  She'd never put herself first, no matter what Eamon thought.  Everything she did was for the betterment of her people.  She was her father's daughter, though she certainly made better choices.

She hadn't chosen her second husband, but she was fully responsible for being a soft-hearted fool who loved him.  

She nearly dug a rut in her sitting room floor, pacing back and forth and wondering if she was going to lose her second king to some half-cocked adventure.

Her father told her a story about Maric once, about how he did the same; took off with the Grey Wardens without warning, without guards, without a lick of good sense.  It was the first time Loghain thought he was dead and perhaps that was why he'd railed so hard against the notion he was lost when his ship went down.  And here was Maric's second son, doing the same fool thing, and putting her into the same position as her father. 

Months.  It had been months; nearly an entire season since he'd disappeared.

It was breaking her heart.

 

****

 

The days came and went with much the same flavor, petitioners at the throne, whispers from the court about where the King had gone.  Much of that gossip was not kind and the longer time dragged on, the more untoward it became.  She'd not been able to give this husband an heir either, though he never questioned her part in it.  He was a Grey Warden, at least in his blood.  He told her what that meant.  As the years went by without him planting a child in her, the more unlikely it became that he would.  Now, it was nigh well impossible.  This year, Anora would be thirty-five and if she'd not born his child by now, it would likely never happen.

That hurt her too, far more than anyone knew.

This day wore on her more than usual.  So many Banns, so many frivolous complaints and arguments.  The chair beside her felt conspicuously empty.  Anora listened, though with hardly her full attention; her elbow was on the arm of the throne, rubbing her temple absently as this idiot was bellowing over mere handfuls of farmland, six missing cows and a particularly beloved goat.  There were three more waiting behind him.  This was asinine.  She was nearly ready to send them all away and begin anew tomorrow after a very long bath and several glasses of Orlesian red when the main doors to the hall swung open with a flourish.

_Wonderful, more of them.  What foolishness was-_

Anora got up from her throne slowly, hands gripping the arms as she stood until her knuckles blanched white.  The man wore a cloak with the hood pulled up, his broad shoulders draped with the fur lining.   _Those broad shoulders, that gait, that-_  He looked up and pushed his hood back.

She almost expected him to quip at her, something flippant and humorous, but his face was as dark as a storm cloud.  

His face.

_Alistair._

She didn't get a chance to speak before Eamon did, in his usual place at the foot of the dais, judging her every move, every decision just waiting for her to make a mistake.  

"Your Majesty," he said, crossing his arms over his chest in a salute.  "You've returned."

"Obviously."  Alistair's voice was terse, despite his off-the-cuff reply.  The banns looked to him expectantly.  He carefully did not look at Anora.

Eamon didn't wait again, but this time Anora was grateful.  "Gentlemen, ladies.  We know your concerns are important, but if you could return tomorrow, we will address your petitions then."  

They left with nods and kind, quiet words to the King, but with surprisingly little grumbling.  Perhaps they felt guilty for their private words, the ones that said the King had left to find a new Queen, that he'd left because he did not want to be King, that he left because Anora was a horrible harpy that would chase the scales off a dragon if given the chance.

Alistair nodded at Eamon.  "Thank you."  Once they were gone, only Eamon, Anora and their guards remaining, he spoke again.  His shoulders slumped.  He hung his head.  "I found my father."  His words echoed through the room, into immediate pin dropping silence.  "He's dead."

Without waiting for a reply or another word, he left the hall towards the Royal chambers.  He never once looked up to see his queen, standing in stunned silence in front of their thrones.  She wrapped her arms around herself and swallowed the lump in her throat.  She didn't say a word until she saw Eamon turn and look as if he was going to follow the King.

"Arl Eamon," she said, stopping him.  Teagan was Arl of Redcliffe now, but Eamon was acting as the Arl of Denerim until the next Landsmeet.  It kept him busy and out of her hair a little at least.  He knew it too, but had the grace to not complain.  "If you would, can you please be sure the court is informed the King has returned?"

He nodded, though she could tell he was put out.  "Of course, your Majesty.  I will see to it."

She stared at the hallway for a long time after he was gone, looking into the shadows where Alistair had disappeared.  Her mind provided a thousand scenarios, all which made her nauseated.  She could think of no way she could walk back to their private chambers and be happy ever again.

She had been happy with him, mad as it was.   _Very happy._   She never told him.  

Now, it felt like he was gone for good, even more gone than when he  _was_  gone.  But if Anora was anything, she was too strong to let her emotions get the better of her.  She was the Queen of Ferelden and Fereldan women did not walk away from unfinished business.  She was a Mac Tir before she was a Theirin, and Mac Tirs did not leave things undone either.

It was her job to speak to her King, no matter what would happen.  Even if he'd come home to set her aside.   _Wouldn't that please Eamon immeasurably?_  It would be what it would be, whatever the King had decided but she would be the strong woman she'd always been and she would walk into that room with her head held high.  It didn't matter if it broke her heart.

Her heart wasn't important.

 

****

 

She found him in their bedroom.  It was the last place she expected him to be.  He had his own bedroom, of course, as Cailan had.  But unlike Cailan, more often than not Alistair spent his nights with her.  Perhaps they never spoke of feelings, despite nearly a decade of marriage, but she thought that his presence was telling enough.  

It was cold and lonely without him.

She expected that he would retreat to his own space, to be away from her, or at least to a common area designed to be shared.  Everything in his posture in the hall; the way he avoided her eyes, the way he never spoke a word to her.  It felt so telling.  What else could it have been?

But here he was in the room that was technically hers, that she thought of as  _theirs,_  sitting on the bed with his head in his hands.  He's taken off his fur lined cloak, his worn leather armor underneath.  He was dusty from the road and the leather was stained with dark spots that looked suspiciously like blood, but all in all, he seemed whole and undamaged in any physical sense.  He did not look up when she came in.  He didn't acknowledge her at all.

She waited a few heartbeats.  She wasn't even sure he knew she was there.

"Alistair?"  She cursed herself for the way her voice cracked when she spoke.

His head whipped up.  His eyes were red and bloodshot.  His face, so neutral and cold in the hall was the picture of distress.  Alistair bolted to his feet and crossed the room before she could even react, grabbing her fiercely and burying his face in her neck.  Instinctively, she wrapped her arms around his shoulders.  He was shaking.  She felt the dampness of tears on the skin at her throat.

"Maker, I'm sorry Anora," he muttered, his voice thick with emotion.  "I couldn't even look at you because I knew I would break down and..." He trailed off, breathing hard.  "I'm so sorry I tried to convince Amell to execute your father.  I didn't know...I didn't know how much it would hurt."

"Oh," Anora spoke without thinking.  Her heart felt like melted snow in springtime  "Alistair."

His arms wrapped around her tighter.  "I'm never leaving again, not until my Calling, I swear."  He lifted his head to look at her.  His amber eyes were wet, his cheeks were sunburned and his tears had left trails in the dust on his skin.  His hair was disheveled.  He was a wreck.

Anora's heart thudded int her chest, firmly against her better judgement.

"I love you."  He just blurted it out.  The words hung in the air for a moment.

"You-" Anora uncharacteristically stumbled over her mouth.  "What?"

Alistair got a crooked smile on his face, a bit of his usual mischievous light returning to his eyes.  " I love you," he repeated.  "I should have told you a long time ago."

Anora was flabbergasted and she was so rarely shocked by anything she had no idea how to respond.  Perhaps she loved him; that much was true.  She knew he'd grown fond of her, but she never expected to hear these words again in her life, not unless she somehow had a child, a dream that was fading away like sunlight at dusk.  

Alistair's smile broadened, just a little.  It made her heart feel too big for her chest, seeing that expression override his pain.  "I don't think I've ever seen you speechless before," he said with a hint of a laugh in his voice.

Anora shook her head.  Several unprecedented things happened today, had happened in the last few moments already.  What was one more?

"I love you too, though it's hardly wise."  

He grinned at her.  "I thought so."

She cocked her head and feigned annoyance.  "I did not think I was so easy to read."

"Only to me," he said.  His smile faded a little, replaced by a soft, overwhelmingly affectionate expression. "That's how I knew I loved you, when I could see that you felt the same way."  He frowned a little.  "But it wasn't until I saw Maric, until I saw his last moments that I knew I couldn't pretend knowing was as good as saying it.  There is no way to know what will happen tomorrow.  I didn't want to die like he did, without getting the chance to tell the people I cared about how I felt."

Anora couldn't help but smile at him.  This was not the raw mannered boy she married anymore, nor was he impetuous and reckless like Cailan.  Alistair was his own man; a King, her husband.  In his way, he was a better King than his father or brother had ever been.  If she hadn't loved him before this moment, she would have now.

She didn't have words for it.  Neither did he. Instead, he kissed her and she kissed him back.

He'd been gone for a long time.  Anora thanked the Maker that he was home.


End file.
